Archive for July, 2018

August (named after the very unhumble Roman first citizenAugustus Caesar) will be a month of personalities from the Sea of Stars (and possibly other places). If there is someone -or something– in particular you would like to see, write a comment or otherwise let me know.

I will be off to GenCon from the end of July to early August but page updates should continue during that time (and this is where you can find me at GenCon). If you have not commented before, your comments may have to wait to be approved once I get back (sorry).

My schedule is unusually up in the air this year as I am part of a new team for my employers at Alderac Entertainment Group (AEG). The two fixed points I know in my schedule are:

Friday, 6pm – 2am(ish), you will find me in the Board Game Hall overseeing and helping with AEG’s Big Game Night (BGN). I will be busy but if you want to come and learn one of the recent AEG games, drop by after 9pm and you can join in and play (though not get any swag unless you already have a ticket). As it winds down I will have more free time, though you may have to talk with me as I check and back away demo games. In any case, feel free to drop by.

Saturday, 2-6pm, I will be demonstrating the new games from BGN at the AEG booth in the exhibit hall.

Thursday day and night and Friday during the day, I will be around the main floor of the Embassy Suites teaching board games to our team for BGN. Not sure exactly where or how busy that will be, so drop by if you are in the area there should be a cluster of people learning board games and I will be among them.

Spotting me in a crowd! On duty I will be wearing a red AEG t-shirt and my hair (pulled back in a pony tail) and beard are mostly white, and I am an average height slightly overweight white man, so, yeah, I will not be that easy to spot. I have included a picture to make it easier.

Beyond that, who knows? But I arrive on Tuesday to help with setup. So drop me a note if you want to try and meet up, I am sure we can work something out.

In any case, to all those going and not going, have fun and play more games.

Share the Knowledge:

Like this:

“Although it spells the end of employment, I am glad to see this war ending,” said Voddick, watching the signing ceremony.

“I agree,” said Gollaon before taking a bite of apple.

“Where next for us?”

“Perhaps we can get work escorting some of the envoys home? Some of them seem unconvinced that the peace will hold.”

‘Good thought.”

Briand’s Chain of Peace

These chains are usually ornate symbols of status but occasion are relative plain, only bearing a seal of authority on the chain. Depending on the tradition of the makers, they may be necklaces or belts, in either case, they must be prominently displayed to function.

Like this:

So, about every four weeks I GM a Learn to Play D&D (Fifth Ed) session as part of Tyche’s Games‘, our local game store, Friday Night Initiative program to teach RPGs to people. This last Friday was one such session, it had four players, three of whom had played in my games before and one new player to D&D as well as my games.

Everyone generated starting characters and it was decided that everyone knew each other, so they were starting as a group, The initial adventure had them following up on a mystery in the town they were in, two teenagers had disappeared in recent nights. They set a trap and they managed to lure out the creature and then chase down to its lair in the basement of a house. That all went well and the monster was dispatched in a brutal and noisy battle that, in usually D&D fashion only took about thirty second in the game world and the kidnapped teenagers were found and recovered. However, the house owner had no idea what was happening and shouted down “what is going on down there?” after the fight ended.

One player at first made a jokey reply (“We’re naked don’t come down.”) and then when the house owner showed up at the top of the stairs, tried to use a Persuasion skill roll to get him to come down. Note that this was just after sounds of combat and the player character was holding a battle axe, so even though the player rolled well for the Persuasion skill, the house owner would not come down but was willing to keep talking. When the house owner said that they would go to the authorities, the player tried Intimidation and the house holder ran, again even though the player rolled well (17ish) because that what you do when someone with a weapon threatens to preform violence against you. The player seems annoyed that his “good” rolls did not allow him to control the situation (i.e. the actions of the NPC). Now, it did not matter as the the important part was the rescue and everything else was glossed over in the glow of saving the teenagers and the monster being defeated, as it should be. Escalating the situation with the house owner was an unnecessary digression, I just tossed him in for color, and no reason to have it distract from the game as a whole.